During the Civil War, President Lincoln insisted that New York Avenue Presbyterian Church remain open for worship while other churches were occupied by the federal government and used as offices and hospitals. From his pew there, he said that churches were needed as never before for divine services. The pastor, Dr. Phineas D. Gurley, served as Lincoln's spiritual guide through the war and during the fatal illness of Lincoln's young son, Willie, who left his small savings of $5 to the church on his deathbed. Lincoln regularly traveled the short distance from the White House to attend, seeking solace in midweek Bible classes and sequestering himself in an adjacent room with the door ajar so as not to disturb others with his presence. The church had been founded in 1793 by Presbyterian carpenters working on the White House grounds. Lincoln's hitching post remains outside, and his pew still stands in the somewhat enlarged, 1950s replica of the original church. A document in Lincoln's handwriting proposing that the federal government end slavery by paying owners to free their slaves is displayed in the church's Lincoln parlor; this plan was carried out, but only in Washington, D.C. The church dominates an area now called Herald Square, named for the Washington Times-Herald newspaper, which once occupied the white building at 1307 New York Avenue, where publisher Eleanor Medill "Cissy" Patterson created the nation's first round-the-clock newspaper and became one of the country's most powerful women before her death in 1948.
